The invention relates to an assembly for feeding projectile ammunition in an armored vehicle equipped with a rotating turret having a weapon carrier to which a cartridge magazine in the form of a container is detachably connected at some point about its rearward end, and having in its interior a container conveyor and a container reloading station positioned beneath a port in the armored roof so that, when the turret is rotated to an indexed position and the weapon carrier is elevated to an indexed position, the reloading station is aligned with the container connection located on the weapon carrier.
In such a mechanism as shown in German Patent Specification No. 30 22 410, filling the container conveyor is accomplished by consecutively loading filled reserve containers which are transported to the battle area by suitable ammunition vehicles. If there are exhausted containers in the container conveyor, these must first be removed individually before filled containers can be introduced to replace them. As a result, the entire process of munitioning is complicated, time-consuming and therefore dangerous. As will be appreciated, the situation is more dangerous the longer an armored vehicle remains stationary during munitioning and possibly combat-unready as well. Moreover, there is the loss in firepower due to longer breaks in combat necessitated by munitioning.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a novel assembly for storing and conveying ammunition containers in which the process of munitioning can be carried out more easily, quickly, and conveniently with a reduced degree of danger and, at the same time, reduced losses in firepower.
Another object is to provide such an assembly in which transport mechanism is self-contained within a mother container which is readily loaded and unloaded from the armored vehicle.
A further object is to provide such an assembly in which full containers are readily transported to the weapon carrier and moved therefrom into a storage position within the mother carrier.